Primal Promise

Twenty-Nine

The next few days were a whirlwind.  The scattered Kasabe were once more gathered at the ranch.  The captured Nesri were dealt with in various ways.   Only two lived to see the dawning of a new week.  

The Van Houtons had returned from Isabella's with evidence of a twisted tale of murder and betrayal.   Isabella's grandmother had foretold the Yawanea.  A woman who saw beyond the veil, who could council with the ancient ones, who was a vessel of the power of raw nature.  

Her son, Isabella's father, was a man of radical ideas.  He believed that the tribes should rule the humans like shepherds over sheep.  That humanity had proven itself incapable of being trusted with their own survival.  When Isabella had been born, he had been sure she was the one prophesied and planned to use her to aid his cause.

He insinuated himself with a growing group of dissatisfied Kasabe.  Men who wanted to go back to the ways of the old world.  Living off the land and spreading peace and understanding.  Most were the flower-child, hippie peaceniks, but a few aligned with his secret agenda.  When the rift came, he took his son but left Isabella with her grandmother as a spy until she came of age and got her gift. 

 Isabella, always believing it would come to her, had studied and apprenticed with her grandmother from her youth.   She had been alone with the old woman when she'd come out of a vision and declared she'd seen the face of the Yawanea.  Named Abigail Murray as the one who would lead them. 

It was horrible enough that she was not going to get what she believed was her promised reward for putting up with the old woman's babbling for years.  To go to the one woman who already had stolen Jessie?   It was too much to bear, and in a rage, she'd murdered her grandmother. 

She had contacted her father secretly.  She would remain a spy within the Kasabe.  Liam Murray, who had been one of those weaker Nesri, wanted only peace and love among all people.   He was going to return to the Kasabe.  If he discovered his daughter had the power of the Yawanea, it would be in the hands of people just like him.  Fools.  It had to be stopped.  Cross solved two problems at once. 

Or so they thought.  Isabella had come to the camp to take Jessie for her own.  His mate was gone, he would turn to her and she would be his at last.  He rejected her.  Hours later, Abigail returned.   The men on Savortini's side, most of the males at this point as the better ones had returned to the Kasabe or sought places in packs outside of Oregon, attacked the girl as a traitor.   

Jessie was shoved aside and Isabella had begged him to come away with her.  When he refused, she stabbed him in the heart and ran back to her grandmother's home before anyone knew she was missing.  She was halfway down the mountain when the fire struck.  It killed her father, and almost took her brother's life as well, but he survived.  And with him, the Nesri's plan. 

Isabella remained, a spy in their midst as her brother Gianni took their message underground and around the world, collecting like-minded members of the countless tribes all with one goal.  World domination.  

When she was old enough, she took her place as the new medicine woman under the young James Holt, a man too easy to guide to making bad choices once his beloved mate was six feet under.  

She knew of the child born of Abigail.  Knew she would be compelled to return.  Spent years sowing the seed that Yawanea was a curse.  A rotten apple that would spread its rot and destroy the tribe.  When the woman returned to the mountain, she had expected her to come in power, not in ignorance.   She was nothing. 

So intent had she been on the mother, she had missed the child until it was too late.  When James had called her, saying his son had found a little girl saying her name was Yawanea, she had reinforced the lie that she was dangerous.  Fed his fear that he would never be as good a leader as his father had been.   He could never let any of his people see him as weak.   Admitting he had been wrong about something... was weakness.  They would turn on him.